To the Ones Becoming

I realized I have no respect for time… or maybe it’s overconfidence. Yes, I have a very busy life (though a productive one). "Almost everyone does, Juliana, lol" Me: I know and that is why I am here writing about this. I know not all high achievers or ambitious people give 19 waking hours to tasks without white spaces or buffers. This busy life is structured. Very structured. Meaning, I know what I want to do each day. The problem is when to do it. I struggle with scheduling. Some days, I’m busy from 4:30 AM to midnight. That’s not sustainable, and I feel it. I’ve said this countless times: I crave depth. I know and have seen what it can do for me. The more focus I give something, the quicker I can finish it. But I’m still learning to be a person of depth, still recovering from social media attention drain, though I occasionally relapse.  Right now, gathering all my attention on one task takes time. And yes, it drains me. Some days, I feel my willpower is about to run out. St...

Just Start. I honestly wish I could write only that and call it a wrap, because truly, it is not more, not less. Just start. We have all heard this phrase countless times. And I think that is exactly why I am writing about it today. Sometimes, when something is repeated too often, we begin to lose its weight. Especially when people we don’t trust or don’t think know what they are saying keep saying it. But I’ve realized something. The fact that a word or phrase is repeated by everyone does not and will never undermine its meaning. I know this because I have seen so many phrases we dismiss as “motivational talk” work powerfully in my own life, once I actually practice them. One of them is: just start. Just start clueless. Just start uncertain. Just start full of doubt. Just start not ready. Just start afraid. Just start . We are 53 days into the year. I found myself thinking that if I hadn’t started the things I began on January 1st, these 53 days would still have passed, but they w...

The year is getting busier. I must say. This week, I struggled to tick off everything on my list. I thought I had a structure in place. (Screams.😂) But the good thing is this: I actually do have a structure. And if I didn’t, with how busy the week became, I would have faltered. I would have failed, woefully, not positively, and maybe even given up. But I prevailed. So many things tugged at my attention. So many small urgencies tried to scatter me. But I prevailed. And it’s too late to give up now. If you haven’t taken one lesson from all the reflections I’ve written so far, let this be the one: Structure will save your life. It will guard and shield you. This week showed me something important. The year is getting busier. So my structure cannot remain fragile. It has to evolve. For example, with my community, I currently facilitate a weekly finance-focused check-in. That is good. It helps the community grow. But I realized something: I can speed up growth by being more intentional ab...

I turned a new age on Monday, and I am happy about it. I don’t exactly know how I feel, but I know I am happy. I’ve been thinking a lot about my 20s, especially after reading Oladimeji Ajegbile’s reflection on Substack about how our 20s won’t last forever, how they are for building, proving, urgency, and showing up publicly while pretending not to be afraid. How they are for building habits that don’t disappear overnight. That last part is where my focus lies today: habits that don’t disappear overnight. First, I want to say this plainly, building good habits is hard. (This is my personal, unstable philosophy, lol.) Building bad habits, on the other hand, is one of the easiest things on earth. I once read about how the brain works when it comes to habits. When the brain discovers that a habit makes us happy, relaxed, or comfortable, it encourages it. But when it discovers that a habit makes us tired, worried, or stretched, it tries, out of its own version of goodwill, to protect us fro...

Some things I thought I had figured out at the start of the year… I quickly realized I hadn’t. I started the year silently. No loud  “this year is about this or that”  on my status. I just showed up to greet a few people on my contact list a Happy New Year, a Happy New Year on my status, and that was all. I did that intentionally, to prove something to myself. I was done with the “new year, new me” mantra because it doesn’t work. I didn’t try to wake up early on this day, nor did I shower or even have breakfast early. If not for my parents, I wouldn’t have even gone out of the house. It was a new year, true. I felt all the emotions of  “this is a new year, true” . But I also knew, deep down, that it didn’t mean anything had changed within me as a person. I still have fears. I still have habits that drain me. I still have passions I wish to start. And, mostly, there is still a version of me I am yet to become. So, I didn’t try to gas myself up at all. Instead, I sat with r...

A voice came to me as I walked into my CDS venue late. “Juliana, they would need someone to help them take photos and make videos today. You should volunteer.” Normally, I would beat that voice down to stupor until it couldn’t raise its head anymore. But this time, I didn’t. Before I explain what happened next, I need to go back a few hours earlier. It was a Friday morning, last week. I was on my way to my Community Development Service (CDS) weekly meeting. I am subscribed to Oladimeji Ajegbile’s  Figuring Life Out . To be honest, I subscribed simply because I know how committed he is to helping people, especially young creators, grow and scale. Anything Oladimeji has to say, I will read. For the first time, I decided to read one of his reflections. It was titled  Your 20s Don't Last Forever . I read it as I commuted to my CDS venue. One of my goals this year is to learn how to read in public spaces, maximizing free moments for reading instead of social media. So I gave the ne...